There’s lots happening in my vegetable garden this week – the carrots are out, I’ve started pulling my bulb onions, the spring crops are going gangbusters, and we’re finally getting some rain after a very long hot and dry period.
Last year at this time we’d had a fairly cool and wet spring, which really put a damper on pepper production, but this is a good pepper year. I’ve got lots of poblanos and hungarian banana peppers and quite a few nice sweet red bell peppers ripening. The first zucchini has been harvested and the yellow bush beans, which had a very slow start, are now producing magnificently. The black beauty eggplant has also set some fruit.
But of course, the main event is the tomatoes! I’ve now harvested the first 4 of the orange Flamme salad tomatoes. The Cherokee Purple plant is absolutely laden with large fruit and the Cream Sausage and Mortgage Lifter are producing heavily as well. I’m disappointed in the Amish Paste. It seems to have very few fruits, but maybe it’s just getting shaded too much by the Cherokee Purple. The Isis Candy finally has, like, two cherry-size fruits. So this looks to be a season of mixed successes with the tomato varieties. (You can see what I planted in my post Reap What You Sow.)
The good news is that the reflective tape seems to be working so far to keep the birds away. (See How To Protect Tomatoes From Birds.) The bad news is that a couple of the plants are showing signs of stress and/or disease.
So to address whatever blight is affecting these plants I went off to my favorite local nursery and asked for advice. I am pretty sure they have a Calcium deficiency (blossom-end rot) and possibly a Nitrogen deficiency (yellowing leaves). Well, the nursery staff also suggested that the yellow leaves are die back due to the extreme heat we’ve been having. At any rate, I purchased a small bag of Espoma Tomato-tone and applied 3 Tablespoons around each of my tomatoes (and my peppers too) and then watered it in well.
I’m generally pretty bad at remembering to fertilize or even having the intention to “feed” my plants. Instead, I generally rely on seasonal applications of compost and that’s it. So I’ve set a reminder on my 2Do.app to feed the tomatoes every two weeks. Let’s see what happens! I’m really hoping this saves my plants. Happy gardening!
Believe it or not, the first tomatoes are ripening. Not mine, of course, but some of my neighbors at the community garden are already harvesting Supice tomatoes. I’ve got green tomatoes on all of my plants except the Isis Candy cherry tomato (see my Spring planting list here), so it is time to think about protection!
Since I began vegetable gardening I’ve always ended up putting bird netting around the tomatoes, along with a few other deterrents, such as fake predators (more on that later) and shiny whirligigs. Alas, over the years I have unintentionally killed 2 large snakes, and last year two large (mating?) lizards when they have became entangled in the bird netting. Not only is accidentally killing these reptiles contrary to my principles of being a good steward of our environment, it’s really gross! I always find them caught in the netting after they’ve started to decompose.
Bird netting is also really hard to work around when harvesting and I have tripped myself innumerable times. I weigh it down with bricks and then have to move each of the bricks to get in under the netting for harvesting, and somehow the birds still manage to peck any ripe tomato that they can get at through the netting.
So this season I’m trying something different. I’m going to avoid the physical barrier and use scare tape instead. I bought this brand of tape here. I thought about doing this after a really dumb male cardinal kept flying into our dining room windows attacking his own reflection. While googling on solutions to that problem I saw lots of suggestions for hanging scare tape in front of your windows and also for using it in your garden. Apparently birds hate shiny reflective things that move in the wind. I bought the tape and tied lengths of it to my tomato cages and to a pole. I sure hope this works!
Additionally, I’ve got my fake predators – an owl and a fake snake, and I’ll get some new shiny whirligigs from the dollar store (these don’t last too long because high winds rip them up).
Additional ideas I haven’t tried yet:
- hanging red Christmas tree ornaments on the outside of your tomato cages so that the birds come to expect hard, inedible tomatoes
- suspending noise-making and/or shiny objects such as old CD’s
And finally, I follow the most important rule – always pick your tomatoes before they fully ripen and put them on a windowsill to finish up. That nice big juicy fully-vine-ripened tomato you were waiting one more day to pick? It’s going to have bird pecks in it!
How to live slower while working full-time? This is my new concern since I started a full-time contract position in February. First off, I want to state that I don’t regret making this change. I am really enjoying being back at AllClearID, a company I was employed at previously. I feel challenged and valued, both positives in my book, and I am earning more, which is great considering we’ll have two kids in college come this fall.
However, I don’t want to lose what I’ve been working toward over the last few years. I’m trying not to get back on that hamster wheel or fall back into patterns that caused stress and an unhealthy lifestyle. So, considering this, I am trying to stick to certain habits.
Menu-planning
I think this is vital. Over the years one of my top stressors each day was deciding what I was going to make for dinner. I now schedule menu-planning for Saturday and try to do a big shopping trip on Sunday. I don’t end up having to plan every meal because we have more left-overs now that fewer family members are home.
Working from home twice a week
One of the reasons I considered this new job was the twice-a-week work from home policy. So far I’ve only been WFH on Thursdays, but I’m planning to add Mondays soon.
Taking Mass Transit
Once again I have opted out of having a downtown parking spot and I am continuing to take the bus to work. This takes longer but helps me be “green” and enforces patience and tolerance. I can also start biking (my employer encourages it) and I’m going to try walking one-way (4 miles) several days a week to train for our upcoming pilgrimage.
Exercising
I will not sacrifice my personal training appointment or my Hot Barre gym class. I was able to re-schedule my personal training to another morning to accommodate a daily work meeting and I work from home on Thursday so that I can continue attending my Hot Barre class.
Keeping weekends and evenings open
Now that the kids are independent I actually have free time in the evening and weekends and I’m trying to keep it that way, except for social commitments such as church Supper Group. I have bell choir practice in the evening twice a month and have another volunteer responsibility for a couple of hours the first Saturday of the month.
Getting extra help in the yard
I hired a yard guy to help with the grunt work in the yard on a regular basis. Now I can enjoy the creative gardening and not worry about mulching, mowing, edging or leaf blowing.
Keeping up my use of 2Do.app
I wrote about this app in my post Finding a Daily Rhythm. It continues to help keep me on track and not let the house work get behind. It also reminds me of the pets’ monthly meds and tasks like turning the compost or watering the plants. The lists I have currently configured include Home (repeating household tasks), Grocery Needs, Decluttering Tasks, Home Repairs and Week’s Meals.
That’s it for now. Life is always evolving and this is just a new set of transitory conditions. I’m hoping to maximize the positive and remember what is important.
The final fruits of the winter garden are ready. Carrots, green onions and beets are now on the menu! I’ve got beds prepped with fresh compost and the onion crop is in (although it had a set-back because the grackles ate the tops off of all the onion sets). The heirloom tomato sale was last weekend and I’ve got some interesting new varieties to try. Here’s what I’m growing this year:
- Morgage Lifter – I had to try this large pink tomato just because of the name
- Cherokee Purple – very popular around here
- Amish Paste – I’ve never tried a paste tomato, so I’m excited to try some making some sauce with this
- Flamme – I’m hoping this is the Jaune Flamme I grew last year which produces super tasty sald size orange tomatoes
- Isis Candy – this is a cherry tomato with a cat’s eye on the blossom end
- Cream Sausage – creamy white paste tomato. How unusual!
For peppers, I’ve got the usual bell peppers, sweet banana, poblano (for migas breakfasts) and then I’ve got the standard Black Beauty eggplant. I usually plant green beans too. I guess I need to get those seeds in!
It seems like Spring came very early this year but I’m delaying planting the transplants until next week just in case.
I’ve got an update on one of my goals for the year -“Goal 4: Increase Income”. I’ve gone back to work full-time at a former employer and I’m really enjoying it. It going to take some work to keep striving for a slower, simpler life though. I’ll post more on that soon I hope…
I’ve taken a while to try to get my thoughts in order around my goals for the year. In the end many of my goals are continuations of last year’s, with a bit more structure involved.
Homemaking
Goal 1: Get More Organized!
To this end I have decided to follow the Home Organization 101 14-week challenge from www.abowlfulloflemons.net (Challenge guide here). I’m going to have to customize it a bit, because I already know that some of the tasks are going to take me longer than one week – but I’m going to stick as closely as I can and complete this challenge! I will get my house clean and organized and feel like I’ve really accomplished something.
Goal 2: Declutter!
I’ve added a Decluttering Task list to my 2Do app to help me out with smaller-sized decluttering tasks based on Abby Lawson’s 15 minute organizing task list (Tasks PDF here). These are smaller tasks that can be done anytime with minimal time investment but big impact.
Goal 3: Digital Organization
I need to choose a password manager and organize and reset all of my passwords so that they can be secure. I’ve put this off for too long.
Career
Goal 4: Increase Income
Last year wasn’t so great for income, considering I didn’t have much work in the fall. We’ve got tuitions to pay for, traveling during Rich’s sabbatical, and helping with the cost of a new living community for my mother. This means I’ve got to increase my work hours this year, without sacrificing my quest for a slower life. If I go back to working full-time I need some work-from-home time AND I need to have evening meals pre-planned and prepped. This means that I need serious menu-planning action.
Personal Health
Goal 5: Determine how I want to use my Fitbit
I received a Fitbit from Santa this year. I’d like to figure out how to use it most effectively. I’m currently using it to track steps, activity, and heart rate but would like to explore using it for calories, water consumption, and mindfulness reminders. We might use it for mapping our progress when we’re walking the Camino De Santiago in Spain next fall.
Goal 6: Modified Whole 30
I’d like to find a sustainable dietary change that I can stick with. The Whole 30 worked great last year, but I regained the weight, so I need a PERMANENT change like when I gave up soda one Lenten season and never started drinking it again.
Green Living
Goal 7: Use less Plastic
I intend to research and choose a way in which to reduce our plastic use.
Goal 8: Conserve More Water
I’d like to add timers to our showers (although I haven’t found any useful ones yet) and possibly replace our toilets.
Spiritual
Goal 9: Prepare for Sabbatical
I’m looking forward to planning our trip to France/Spain for walking the Camino and taking practice walks in preparation.
Goal 10: Altruism
I intend to continue knitting hats, this time for homeless youth here in Austin.
Other
Goal 11: Finish a craft project
I’d like to finish a cross stitch or knitting project started years ago, doesn’t matter which one.
Intelligence is, at its bones, the ability to learn well. But cleverness is the ability to apply intelligence. Understanding alone is no help if one does not apply it.
My little Christmas gift bags. Each bag contains one of my cold-process soaps, peppermint lip balm and rosemary-mint massage oil – all home-made from natural oils and scented with essential oils. These were a lot of fun to put together. I found the gauze bags for the soap at Jo-Ann Fabric’s in the bridal section. The template for the lip balm label was found online and I made my own label for the massage oil. The absolutely adorable tiny bags were from Dollar Tree.
‘Tis the Season…of holiday parties and get-togethers – a time for sharing and fellowship with family and friends. It should be a joyous time, and often is, but I have to admit that sometimes hostessing one of these events stresses me out.
Hospitality is an important duty in Christianity, especially when offered to the traveller and stranger. I think about past times in human history when a stranger’s hospitality could have meant the difference between life and death. Offering food, shelter and drink was the moral thing to do. I’m sure it was also a source of pleasure, an opportunity for sharing news, stories, and experiences and meeting new people.
So why do I find offering hospitality so daunting? My mother-in-law blamed Martha Stewart! Martha’s brand is based on the illusion that the modern woman can be all things – career woman, brilliant hostess, accomplished cook, stunning decorator and creative homemaker. It’s impossible to live up to these glossy standards. Now, realistically, I know my guests probably aren’t judging my decorating, or running their fingers across my furniture checking for dust, but I still can’t help but see all the faults in my home when I am faced with the prospect of welcoming guests into it. The combination of an old house and two furry pets certainly makes spiffing up the house a big job.
The yard is also a big stressor. We love our screened in porch and have a nice deck in the back yard. So, every time we are going to host a dinner or party, we straighten up the yard, clean off the outdoor furniture, prepare mosquito repellant torches and set up lighting, etc. so that folks can enjoy the backyard. It can take me one to two weeks to clean up the yard, depending on the time of year. Ironically, during a party we hosted last month the weather was perfect, the yard was welcoming, and yet, not a single guest stepped outside! Everyone preferred to congregate inside.
All of this leads to a tiny bit of dread when it comes time to host — but I am working on controlling this reaction and trying to be more relaxed about entertaining. I know I always enjoy having guests over and I’m always glad in the end that we did it. I also really wish we had family in the area, as I would love to have my relatives over, and I wouldn’t care in the slightest if the the floor hadn’t been swept!